centrotype

English

Noun

centrotype (plural centrotypes)

1. (cluster analysis) The data point in a cluster that is closest to the centroid.
   • 1994, Canadian Journal of Microbiology: - Volume 40, page 951:

     This centroid represented a hypothetical organism with a centrotype selected as the actual organism closest to the centroid for each cluster ( Sneath and Sokal 1973 ) .

   • 1994, I.E. Frank, Roberto Todeschini, The Data Analysis Handbook, page 229:

     The final partition is obtained in an iterative procedure that relocates an object, i.e. puts it into another cluster if that cluster's centrotype or centroid is closer.

   • 2008, Frédéric Cao, José-Luis Lisani, Jean-Michel Morel, A Theory of Shape Identification, page 227:

     The criterion function to be minimized is usually the sum of the average dissimilarities between each centrotype and all of the other patterns of the same cluster.

   • 2012, F.G. Priest, Alberto Ramos-Cormenzana, B.J. Tindall, Bacterial Diversity and Systematics, page 217:

     The strain closest to the centroid was designated the "centrotype" (indicated with the superscript "CT"). The centrotype organism can be thought of as the "Reference Strain" which most closely represents the essential and discriminating features of each cluster as a whole.

Usage notes

The idea of a centrotype is very similar to that of a centroid, but a centrotype must actually exist, whereas a centroid is an abstractly calculated value.